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25 Domain Sales $25MM+

I have only sold 35 of my 6500 domains.

Porno.com $8,888,888.88

This was the 4th largest recorded cash domain sale ever!
(Purchased for $42,000 in 1997) It is important to note that this domain had career earnings in excess of $15 Million via pay per click earnings and never had adult content)

989.com $818,181.81 (registered for $100 in 1997)

899.com $801,000 (registered for $100 in 1997)

9595.com $180,000 (registered for $100 in 1998)

Teem.com Total $972.000 after Equity payout

Earlier sales….

Men.com $1,320,000 (bought from 3rd party for $15,000 in 1997)

eBet.com $1,350,000 (registered for $100 in 1997)

Property.com/Properties.com $4MM + Equity Stake
(Bought from 3rd party for $750,000 in 2005)

I often complain about organizations having meeting after
meeting and making no decisions. What a waste of time, talent and energy.

General McChrystal, US Commander in Afghanistan, was
interviewed last week on 60 Minutes. He said something that caught my
attention. I played it over and over again.

“An average organization when someone asks when you want
somethingthey pull out a
calendar, but in a good organization, they pull out their watch.”

I think you can easily take this one step further when we
talk about “Decision making”. Does your company use a Calendar or a Watch? Are
you average or are you good? These are very fair questions. This is the single
biggest threat to companies survival. I deal with it daily. Folks can make no
decisions. They need permission to do their jobs.

There is a leak in the boat
and instead of taking the chewing gum out of your mouth to plug up the leak
until it can be fixed properly, they need permission. They need permission from
their boss. They need permission from his boss. Then they need to have a
meeting about it. Then they have a second meeting. Then they finally submit it
to “Legal” who gives you 6 IDIOTIC reasons that somebody else has to use their
gum until the project can be bidded on.

It was 1981. It was out west. Utah I think. I was driving on
a meandering road with my girlfriend at the time, Chrissie. There was a rainbow
in the distance, but it was getting closer. Vivid as any rainbow I had ever
seen. The road meandered and curved and the land was flat. That rainbow was
getting damn close. Oh my, I was there. Right in the midst of the end of that
rainbow. The blue dashboard I had on my car was now sizzling and dazzling in all types of
colors. Like nothing I had ever seen. Like nothing I have seen since. It did not last long, but it was a solid
10 seconds. Maybe 15. I was jumping up and down in my seat. It was truly an
unbelievable moment. Many don’t believe me when I tell them this story. I swear
to you and everyone reading that I was truly at the end of a rainbow and I
testify that is what happened. I have yet to meet somebody else that has
actually been at the end of one, but there is no doubt that some have and I
look forward to hearing their testimony as well.

So you can choose to believe me or not, I have no control. I
can just state the facts. As for Chrissie, she did not last long after that
event. She was not impressed by being at the end of the rainbow nor could she
grasp my excitement. So I guess I
divide the universe into those that believe in rainbows and those that don’t.
Those that believe in magic and those that don’t. Those that believe in themselves and those that don't.

Many people get upset and lash out when they are forced to
think. When they are forced to look at what they are doing. When we have a failure. We are brainwashed in school that failure is bad. But failure is the only path to success that I know. I hope to fail a dozen times today. With each failure comes the silver lining of knowledge that turns failure into success. That knowledge may be known to all others that have had the same failure or you may have found a unique failure. A unique failure can become a great success.

Let’s back up. How
many hundreds of millions of sites are there? How many billions or trillions of pages are there? So out
of all these millions and millions and millions, and billions and billions how many have had a strickly
online success and had a business do more than $10 million annually? Even $1
million annually? How many?? What is the percentage? We all know the answer. It
is miniscule. It can't even be measured. That is a HIGH mountain to climb. Then it is how high do you want
to climb and how many fall to their demise on the climb? These are all
questions to ask. What we are all doing is searching for answers and
formulas that work and create a spark. Most of us have our basic foundational formula in place, but it is
about the second act. The third act. Orville and Wilbur knew they wanted to
fly. They failed every day of their life in that achievement, until they didn’t
fail. Probably everyone told them to buy a horse or one of those new horseless
carriages.They searched for a
formula. Each little success was one step forward. Each little failure was one
step forward. Both can have great value if you job is to eliminate things and
focus on others.

How many years do you think it would take to just look at
your domains and decide to open 1000 full fledged businesses? Not just 'Develop' for the sake of it, build businesses. Let me give you a
quick answer. You won’t live long enough. Your kids won’t live long enough. So
while folks 'Develop' and experiment with minisites, PLAY with TEMPORARY search traffic, I look at
everything a bit different. I already got the hair on some of your backs up.
But read on before you form your opinion.

See we don’t have time to build 1000 businesses and then we
certainly don’t have the TIME to run 1000 businesses. BUT…..when you are a fool
like me, you go against the grain.
So I realized many years ago that building 1000 businesses was not a
possibility. 5000? 50,000, Not in 10 lifetimes.

However there is another way once you all stop laughing and
shaking your head. You can laugh. I employ. I look forward. I look to see what
things will look like when they evolve, NOT today, not yesterday. What the hell is that Rick??

Well, we may not have time to build 1000 businesses but we certainly have the time to do 1000 joint ventures. So I own JointVentures.com. Think about
that. When Trump owns a piece of land he does not build it, he partners with a
DEVELOPER and contractors and takes a slice. His TIME commitment is limited to
making the deal. Anytime you can invest little or no time and get a return, you
are a winner!

So in my mind development is a joint venture that becomes a big business. That won’t
work for everyone. It will and does work for me. And again, it is not the
developing that counts, it is the business. I can’t run 1000 businesses well.
But I certainly can team up with partners to run 1000 businesses well. Nearly
15 years into this and I have never waivered from this belief. Matter of fact,
I have never been more confident about it. Now the only thing that will change is
the percentage split. In time my share will increase with every deal I make.
The goal is 50%. In some cases it may be higher. In most cases it will be much
lower. Do you ever wonder what 10% of 1000 businesses would look like??

So keep laughing. The picture I have in my mind of what I
want to accomplish is clear and very different from others. That is ok, none of
us can have the same business plan. They are all unique. What we can do is
compare notes. Share ideas. Share our path.Don’t judge a work of art until it is finished. My picture needs
less than 5 years to really take shape, take form and change the way everyone does
business in this industry.

You can see
that very clear and vivid divide. It is just how you approach things. A
waitress goes to work and every day earns dollars. The days she does not work,
she gets nothing. So some in this business work like that. They have to hustle
every day to make ends meet. No work. No money. Others are much more
methodical. They just do things differently and are not dependant on that job
or even that restaurant.

Here is something I doubt many will agree with. But here
goes. I go out of my way NOT to get search engine traffic. Sorry, but I am
looking for something completely different, much bigger and search inhibits that information
at this stage of the game.

See what I try to do is start with a domain with
100-500 daily type ins. What I want is growth because something on the site
sparked them to come back or tell somebody or list somewhere. That to ME is the
goal. The search traffic clouds that information over at this point. That is fine later on, but in my pea brain, not at this stage. On the otherhand when I have no traffic on a domain I would do the opposite. All you have is search or your own links etc.

My goal is never to have a “Spike” in traffic. It is to
latch on to something that shows growth and THEN worry about stuff like that.
So I come at things a different way. I am not saying it is right. I am saying
it is the method that I employ and use. If I have a domain getting 2 visitors every day, my goal is to bring it to 4. It's not easy. I don't want 23 visitors from search. Not yet. I want to figure out the formaula to grow the traffic from 2 to 4. From 500 to 1000. Once that can be done THEN search traffic becomes important because it can accelerate your growth. But it accelerates because you have a formula, a business, a product, a service.

Have a GREAT Day!

Rick Schwartz

PS: I should have said I doubt 'ANYBODY' will agree with me. But from most f the responses, you folks completely missed my point. You focused on the wrong part of the post imo. Which is more important, meaningful,and long lasting, 1 match to make a fire, 50 matches to make 50 fires or the knowledge to make fire without the matches? Also, this post is not about 'Advice.' It is to share a concept that I employ. Right or wrong. And for the record. I am probably the worst person on the net to develop. But I developed the original TRAFFIC site's content with the great and unselfish help of Mike Fiol who created the original site, logo and navigation which has taken in more than $25 Million between the show and booking hotel rooms. It has had 3 versions besides Mike's original site and layout. By 3 developers. Michelle Miller when she was working with Browser Media. Danny Prior, on the last version and now the Skezno team. But the content and almost every word written came from me. I worked on it every day year after year. Websites are never finished. they evolve. But it is NOT about the site. It is not about search. It is about the BUSINESS. Each element is important. The website, the navigation of the website, the look, the feel and finally the thing that trumps everything else, the product, the business. Sorry, but search is last not first in my book. I could make a case that websites are a waste of time. Build businesses, not websites. That is truly the missing ingredient. Lastly, it also depends what you are looking for. If you are satisfied with a domain making $1/day, $10/day, $100/day, $1000/day that is all well and good. But the truly big money is not there. That's just the foundational money to buy you the luxury of time. Finally, which has more value to YOU. 10 visitors from search or 10 visitors from 'Word of Mouth' advertising? I'll take the latter EVERY single time. So I would rather focus there. Oh I forgot, many don't include 'Word of Mouth' as an option in this new era. But it still is king!

So some interesting questions now arise. Are
minisites dead? The answer is I don’t know but there is no question that some and their
current model may need updating and what worked yesterday won’t work tomorrow. Some of my sites like Widgets.com are licensed and leased. Another was online for 9 years.

Then we shift to Google. The only upsetting part
is that they are judge, jury and executioner. You can’t even defend yourself.
It’s just open and shut. That is my only point here.So I would understand identifying ones they had a problem with as opposed to shutting down without notice.But what is done is done and I won't look back. While there was little
pain for me, what happens when they do it to somebody that absolutely ruins
their life? Personally, I find it difficult to deal with folks like that and I
will do everything in my power from here on to look for alternative solutions
and never again be dependant on a partner that I truly believe as well as many others that I talk to, has a VERY DEEP
DISDAIN for the entire domain industry. I have seen it first hand too many
times and have always given them the benefit of the doubt. Those days are over.
Many folks are just too intimidated to speak out. I hear that a LOT. You folks may remember an incident at TRAFFIC a few shows back involving Google. We gave them stage time to explain. I think it was a load of crap now that I look back!

We can talk about “Developing” until we are blue
in the face. It is not about developing for the sake of it. The IDEA and the
engine you build to make money go thru your cash register is the key. That is
not easy. It is one of the most difficult challenges there is or everyone would
be successful with all their ventures. As we know, more than 90% fail. Online it is even higher.

Here is what I learned from my minisites portion
of the domains using adsense. The stats to me were more important than the
dollars earned. I was just looking for 1 domain to show any sign of life,
growth, interaction that could be built on and further developed. I would gladly trade the money owed to me (Dollars owed is not an issue) for the stats
that cost me quite a lot to obtain. Unfortunately I was locked out. But the
bottom line is this. In EVERY case, traffic did not grow. In EVERY case traffic
remained the same at BEST and mostly declined. In EVERY case I made less money than PPC. Not the
result I was looking for. I may have some more info later as they are now back
at PPC and we will see the numbers there. Lastly, this is not about me or my business model. So don't get distracted from the real issues here.

I will be working on a major post for next week. It is a post to pay close attention to. The sites I had closed were created by different companies. About ten sites, 3 different companies that produced them. I paid TENS of thousands of dollars for them. Three were not minisites. One site I had online for 9 years. BE ON NOTICE! No warning whatsoever from Google. No appeal. No discussion. No nothing. They just pulled the plug, denied access to my account and you may be next. No biggie to me it's chump change. But what if YOU have thousands of sites, tens of thousands? More? No recourse whatsoever. NONE!

First of all this is no accident. You are here for a reason and I will explain right now. Calm down, I promise I won't waste one moment of your time. First, why are you here? Please let me know below. Did you type in TheKing.com? I am sure I disappoint, but destiny is a funny thing so don't leave yet. What you are about to learn is Top Secret! As in TopSecret.com

Over 100,000 people a day type in my domain names on the browser bar. They, like you, are looking for something specific. Something you might not of found with search because of all the spamming and high cost of traffic. I am an expert on traffic on the Internet. Oil fuels a car and traffic fuels the Internet. No traffic and you have nothing.

Did you type in JointVentures.com and end up here? Or one of the other domains I own? Want to know why? I own this great domain name that represents a very large industry. 15-25 people a day type jointventures.com into their browser bar and end up at my Pay Per Click (PPC) page. But guess what? I make no money! The PPC seldoms pays me anything. But I know you folks are real, that you folks have value and you folks are looking for something specific. You are not doing this for your health. Every day of the year 15-25 people come to look for something specific. Something Google and Yahoo still need to figure out. So it is obvious you are looking for something and just not finding it. So I want to talk to you the surfer. The typer. The folks that sometimes make me a lot of money. The folks stores think are not real.

I also want to talk to the businessman that is losing business. I have your customers locked up right here. You will pay for crap and the real folks are here and they are pissed!

53,000 people type in my Porno.com EVERY SINGLE DAY! Enough to fill many ballparks around the country. You folks have great value but advertisers don't believe it. They don't understand that people that look for adult also buy cars, homes, toothpaste, food, liquor, gamble, go on vacations and have spending power that is above average not below average. Sound off!

Whore.com, Slut.com and I can go on and on. You are all here.

Another domain I have is Homemade.com. 400-500 people a day (YOU) come to Homemade.com. But you are only worth less than a penny each. Lol That is what I get if I am lucky. But you have much more value! So I decided to talk to you directly. (Now there is a site just for you)

TheKing.com comes here. I know you are not looking for me and I know it probably makes you unhappy to find me, but hopefully you will do some reading and find a world you never even knew existed. My Grandfather was the “Hosiery King” back in the 1920’s and 1930’s. Just following in his footsteps as the 'Domain King'.

Which domain did you come here on? See I am sick of selling you folks for a few lousy pennies to search engines that don’t appreciate you anyway. You are worth much more than that. You are very valuable. The Ivory Tower folks don’t get it. They are still clueless into what makes some traffic (YOU THE VISITOR) more valuable than others. Basically you are looking for information or to buy something. But you are real, not invisible. Not worthless.

If you typed in RickSchwartz.com you may be looking for one of the 750,000 results Google lists as matches. I hope I am the Rick Schwartz you are looking for. Probably not. But I am the easiest Rick Schwartz in the entire world to find and I never met a Rick Schwartz that I did not like.

Each day I am going to plug in more and more domains that have many thousands of visitors but don’t make money and together we are going to find out why. Pretty exciting?? Ok, not for you, but definitely for me. If I tried this little experiment years ago it just would not work. But today the surfer gets it much better than the retailers who in large part fail the consumer by having a crappy site or telling you to call them after you place an order. They don’t realize that you went on the net to begin with so you would not have to deal with some mindless person at the cash register or calling their 800 number. They would rather lose the sale than actually picking up the phone themselves and calling you.

Did you type in 399.com? Hundreds of you do each day. They say you are Chinese. They also say you have no monetary value because the domain earns nothing. What do you say? Translation coming soon.

How about eGold.com?? As many as 1500 people a day type in that domain especially with the gold so incredibly hot these days. But it is time to talk directly to you as well. You seem to have more value to me than actual gold companies. I see them on TV day and night, but the 1500 a day that come here are just not worth their attention. That is a real DUH! Don’t ya think? Are you looking for gold? I also realize you may be looking for something else. Maybe what you just found is more valuable than what you were looking for to begin with.

Maybe you typed in the domain because Google and Yahoo just failed you. All the results are those paid results or guys just misleading or spamming the engines. Something drove you to type in that domain on the browser bar. My question to you, what was it? Thanks for your time! Want more?? Check out my eRealEstate.com site that has been online for well over a decade!

I may send you somewhere else today or tomorrow or whenever I feel like it. Just remember RicksBlog.com to stay in touch.

Want to know what we might have done if we were out there doing this sort of thing 50 years ago? Well let me introduce you to Mel Simon. He just died but we all know him and most never heard of him. He changed how we live and he changed how we shop. He did not invent the mall but he certainly took it to another level. He changed how we do business and most of all where we do it. He changed our social behavior. He gave folks a destination and filled it with everything they may need. Bottom line, he changed the world. Many of you were in one of his properties within just the last days. Maybe this very moment.

The man with a small dream and a very big result. All of us follow in his footsteps and some like Jeff Bezos just take it to the next level.

2009 is a tough year. Just be sure to do something GREAT before it ends! Make sure your greatest success comes in 2009. Mel had a lot less to work with and in much tougher days.

Now that the $1495 prices are over (Still good until the
techs change the prices later today) we can focus on the schedule and the first
thing we would like to announce is that the TRAFFIC version of the 'Shark Tank'
will now be called the 'T.R.A.F.F.I.C. TEST TRACK'. The 'TRAFFIC TEST TRACK'
is once again going to bring the
entire industry up a notch. We are not stopping there! Besides the
domainers on
stage we are also going to bring in actual Angel Investors and VC's. So
this
becomes a much more serious business event. We are talking real deals
here. Real
futures. Real business. And guess what?? If our panel of experts does
not buy into one of these projects, the audience can! We know if we
pick great projects worthy of talking about, matched with a great and
qualified panel that can do deals on the spot and encouraged by an
audience of professionals that understand the business like we do and
then put actual deals together that we can watch evolve over time....we
will provide a great success for everyone in the industry!

We are still taking applications until September 30th. Just send a 50
word blurb to be followed by
an actual proposal. This is a
chance to make history and a chance to watch history unfold. It will
become the
hottest addition to TRAFFIC since we unveiled the Auctions back in
2004. That
was Howard's idea as well just for the record. When Howard told me his
idea this time I was not too enthuiastic. That was until I watched the
show for 5 minutes. It was a true 'WOW' moment. It was also a great
collaboration between Howard, Rick Latona and myself. After Rick Latona
saw it, he had the same reaction. Matter of fact, everyone I have
talked to that has seen the show, loves the show. So the beauty is each
of
us brought major ideas to the table and it has mushroomed from there.
Let me be very clear. The TRAFFIC TEST TRACK
is going to
be a game changer and a big news maker. It takes ideas to move things
forward. It
takes risk to make opportunity. When you see what we have planned, you
too will
be excited about what is coming. And if you have not watched the
auctual show 'Shark Tank' that is on ABC, it is the best business show
ever! THIS my friends is an education in doing REAL business. One
episode and you too will be hooked. It is that good. A MASTERS in
business in as little as 60 minutes. Real business people doing real
business. Listen to their questions and it will be a roadmap to your
future success. Learn from true renegades!

We are now working on our guest speaker. We will be able to
announce who that will be in about 2-3 weeks. Possibly sooner. We have narrowed
the field but are still open to suggestions as this is YOUR show.

As
you can see, the agenda is starting to take shape. We won't waste your
time or your money. We will make you money. We will nurture opportunity
and bring it to you. Attending T.R.A.F.F.I.C. means you are always steps ahead and not miles behind. We have nothing to sell but a rising tide for all.